Note: Apologies for my sudden (and longer than expected) lack of posts during January. A very important person in our family became ill late last month and I’ve been spending most of my time helping out. My schedule is still not back to normal, but I hope to be posting more frequently. Many thanks for your patience and understanding.

Now that the New Years’ celebrating is over and everyone is settling into always-seems-to-be-snowing 2014 in earnest, I’ve been tossing around some things I’d like to accomplish this year, an informal to-do list of sorts. I’ve given up on setting resolutions, so this list is really more of a rainy-day/too-much-snow-on-the-ground/just-wanna-stay-in/play-hookie-from-life list that I can pick away at during the year. Mini goals, in no special order. Fun ways to spend time in the kitchen, to be sure.

Post navigation

Hello, again, and Happy New Year. From my lack of posts, it appears that Thanksgiving really took its toll on me. I took some time off to handle non-blog business, and as all bloggers hope, I thought I’d be able to eke out time to write a post or two. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. But I’m back now, so thanks for sticking with me, and I hope you all enjoyed a lovely holiday season.

We rang in 2014 with a cozy dinner – and my husband and I cooked together. Not something we do often (he likes to stay out of the way, but is the first in line for tasting!). However, over the years he’s learned some skills, and was a very good sous chef last night. Here’s what he did to make this dinner come together: he prepped and made the mustard-shallot vinaigrette for the string beans, peeled the shrimp for the appetizer, minced the garlic and zested and juiced a lemon for the herb crust on the rack of lamb. But his biggest job of all? Stirring the mushroom risotto. Of course, ever the lawyer, he asked questions. “Do you really have to stand here just stirring?” “Can you stir too much? I’d hate to over-stir this.” And there were others I’ll leave out of this post. Despite the mild line of questioning, he stirred and added stock, and stirred some more, until the risotto was done. As you’ll see, it was cooked just right! (Thanks, honey.)

After days of chopping and peeling and cooking and freezing, Thanksgiving finally arrived, and all the preparations gave way to thawing and warming and roasting and serving. As our family was coming in during the day, the appetizers made their entrance, just the ticket to keep everyone sufficiently satiated until dinner. The onion dip with cracked pepper was heated to almost bubbly, we took the chill off the eggplant and white bean puree, and the creamy herb dip punched up raw veggies.

It’s been a busy – and productive – week since my Thanksgiving post last week. Since then, my nice, neat dining room with some stacked dishes and serving pieces has turned into Thanksgiving Supply Central. We’ve added wine, a large coffee maker, paper goods, and food from the first trip to the grocery store.

On the cooking side, I’ve finished making the squash soup (and froze 2 large batches) and I made one sweet potato torte (see recipe below) and froze it yesterday as a test. I’ve never frozen the torte before, but thought if I could make it early, it would free up precious oven time on Thursday. I’m going to thaw it tomorrow and if holds its consistency after it’s warmed up, my experiment will have worked, which means I’ll make the other one this weekend and freeze that one, too.

Like this:

Post navigation

Starting to stockpile serving pieces and dishes; a friend for our youngest family member

My kids say that if you know nothing else about me, you know I’m fanatical about Thanksgiving. From the time I could pull up a chair next to the stove where my mom was cooking, I’ve been totally enchanted with the pomp and circumstance of this one day. Food, family, football. Did I say food?

Growing up, the production of putting on Thanksgiving was a fascinating home movie for me. I watched mom’s every move – planning the menu at the kitchen table; making a grocery list; pulling out the good dishes, the good silver, the tablecloth. I went food shopping with her, and helped with whatever I could handle. She prepared the food the day before and the day of. It was a traditional menu (turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes with mini marshmallows, green bean casserole, etc.), and although she doesn’t consider herself a gourmet cook, her food was absolutely delicious and the holiday table looked beautiful.

Share this:

Like this:

Post navigation

Sasha, our never-shy-around-food dachshund/beagle, was happy to lap up some soup

Well, I guess it’s my turn to be a little under the weather. I thought my allergies were kicking into high gear again. I do, after all, live on what used to be swampland in southeastern Pennsylvania. What I thought were allergies turned into what I thought was a cold. Sneezing, watery eyes, you know. A day later, what I thought was a cold turned into sinusitis. Blecchhh.

Like this:

Post navigation

It’s been fall for about a month and it’s starting to get a little cooler here in Philadelphia, but I’m not quite ready to make soups and stews just because the calendar says so. I still want to keep summer going (and… my neighbor was kind enough to give me some of the last of his basil), so I thought, how about some basil ice cream? The chef who taught the culinary techniques course I took last year treated the class to basil ice cream one night and it was absolutely – and unexpectedly – delicious.

Post navigation

Sometimes things have a way of working out perfectly. When it happens once, it’s great, but when it happens a second time, we cheer up and down and high-five and are generally grinning ear to ear. After much talk last year about going to New York, my friend Jennifer and I finally got there last August. That first girls’ food day began with a long walk to see Eataly (http://www.eataly.com/) and ended with dinner at The National (http://www.thenationalnyc.com/). We spent a few hours walking through the maze of Eataly’s marketplace and ate lunch there. We checked out Fishs Eddy (www.fishseddy.com), a vintage-y kitchen shop with everything from old-time open stock china and flatware to dishes, glassware, barware, kitchen utensils, and more. Kitschy and cute and great deals. Had we driven to New York, the trunk of the car would’ve been filled. We toted our packages at least 25 blocks to midtown and finished our day with a terrific dinner at hip, quasi-casual The National.

So how did we top last year’s trip? For starters, after we got the confirming email for tickets for the Oct. 3rd taping of The Chew, we went into planning mode. Jennifer got us a reservation at Barbuto; she also suggested a shopping tour of Chelsea Market, an idea I loved since I’ve never been there. And, as if we really needed an big dinner (with a lot of food) after the amazing lunch we were going to have, I pitched Bar Americain, one of our favorites. (OK, the tuna tartare was calling. Can you blame me?)

The architecturally stunning building (inside and out) that’s home to this indoor food fair has undergone several transformations from the original National Biscuit Company complex in the 1890s. Its rich history includes production of such classics as Oreos, Saltines, Mallomars, Barnum’s Animal Crackers and Fig Newtons. The massive ovens of old were replaced with newer ovens and then moved to other locations. In their place are two buildings that house tech companies, the offices of the Food Network, and on the bottom floor, the stores and restaurants that comprise Chelsea Market.

Share this:

Like this:

Post navigation

The peaches and nectarines we picked a couple of weeks ago are long gone, so I gathered up the measly few Ginger Gold apples left from my Highland Orchards adventures and decided to make a batch of apple butter. Clearly underestimating how long the fresh-picked fruit would last, I high-tailed it back to the orchard to get more apples and check out the raspberries (about a week too early). I brought home another 6 or 7 pounds of apples, more than enough to make apple butter and have some left to eat straight from the fridge. Turns out, we love the sweetness and touch of tart/spice of these short-season beauties. Grown first in Virginia near the Blue Ridge Mountains, these pale yellow apples that sometimes have a red patch on the skin are related to the Golden Delicious and Albemarle Pippin apples, according to the Virginia Apple Board.

Share this:

Like this:

Post navigation

Search

Search

Welcome!

I'm Nancy, an avid home cook and writer/editor by trade. Not long ago, I decided to combine my two passions and turn it into this blog. I enjoy cooking because it's structured but lets you color outside the lines, always teaches me something, and is completely relaxing even when there's flour on the floor and tomato sauce sputtering out of the pan. Stop by to read about the good, the bad, and the funny in my quest to become a fearless, better cook.